It's weird, but people ask me if I am nervous that he is a firefighter, and actually, I am not. Sure, I worry when we hear his ladder company is going to a fire, but he wanted to be a firefighter since he was 3.

My biggest fear was when he was waiting for his number to be called to get into the FDNY academy, and was in the NYPD academy. I just knew he wasn't designed to be a cop, and if he became one, I would have been worried every day. But going into fires is what he knows and I know he will be fine.

He also has my Dad watching over him. Dad passed 14 years ago and thought he gave birth to Jimmy. They were inseparable. Joe would never let anything happen to him. This I also know.

My dad is a firefighter so I have so so so much love and respect for those guys. They literally go INTO danger when everyone else is running out... and they sure as hell don't get paid enough money! (at least here anyway)... There is just something about firemen!

~Brittany, Degan and Harlow's mom

"It is true that Pit Bulls grab and hold on. But what they most often grab and refuse to let go of is your heart, not your arm."

pitsnok wrote: They literally go INTO danger when everyone else is running out...

At his graduation ceremony, that is one of the comments made by one of the presenters: "While everyone is running out, these brave men and women run in." It made me cry. But then, I was in tears the whole ceremony.